ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes the nature of, and problems caused by, concentration of ownership, which is considered as the most negative development affecting the commercial broadcasting sector since the deregulation of the television industry in Europe in the 1980s. The control of large parts of the media by a few owners, sometimes with interests in the political sphere or in other businesses, has proved to be detrimental to political and cultural diversity and pluralism and to hurt editorial independence. Although it is hard to prove systematically the damage that concentrated media ownership has infl icted on diversity, pluralism, and independence, there are numerous researched examples of how badly concentration of ownership can hurt media independence. This demonstrates that concentration of ownership in TV, the most infl uential medium in Europe, is potentially dangerous, in that it spawns a concentration of infl uence that can be used for political, personal, ideological, or commercial purposes. This chapter looks into the concentration of ownership in Europe in general, focusing on how this spread to Central and Eastern European media markets after 1990.
